Ending the Cycle

If you've been reading my posts lately you'll have noticed that I am on a serious organizing mission. I feel like up until now I've been a mediocre organizer. I'd clean out spaces and return mostly everything back, just more neatly. Inevitably with in a few weeks (months if I'm lucky) things are back to messy and I have to complete the whole process all over again. It's a vicious cycle of mediocre organizing. Does this happen to anyone else?

Well lately I've been trying to stop this cycle. The spaces that I've been organizing have been thoroughly purged, and everything has been given a very specific place (think "top row, third bin"). What I'm learning is the more specific the place for a specific item, the more likely it is you'll put it back in its place. For example, in an up coming post about my linen closet I'll explain how it was organized in a mediocre way. My son's closet was organized in a mediocre way too. I had a home for some of his things on the top shelf. This is too broad of a space. I ended up just tossing things up on the shelf (which technically was put away) until it was a mess. When you organize try and find specific places. Bins and baskets, tags and labels are an organizers best friend.

Anyway, I've decided to create an organizational plan for the next couple of weeks to help me end this cycle. Right now I'm on an organizing high, I just can't get enough and I can't wait to get to the next space. Thing is, I don't want to get myself so overwhelmed and burn out or get frustrated and just give up. So with out further ado, here is my To Do list:

Organize the guest room/craft room closet, it has become a dumping ground for everything that doesn't have a home.
Organize photos (print and digital) for scrapbooking, I love scrapbooking but I haven't touched an embellishment, paper, or a picture in ages and I wanna get back to my favorite quiet time activity.
Create a kitchen command center(including finishing my family master binder), I've been reading about these spaces, and I have the perfect little office spot in my kitchen.
Finish organizing the pantry, this is already a work in progress.
Organize all the drawers and cabinets in the kitchen.
Clean out and organize the mudroom coat closet.
Make-over/organize the laundry room.
Organize the utility closet.
Organize the holiday closet.
Organize the garage.
Create a new filing system for our papers/bills
Organize the office bookcase.
I have a few small decorating projects I want to tackle as well.

Lol, after actually writing this list out it seems super long. But have no fear, I have not given myself a time limit, and some of these tasks have been started already. As long as I work on one thing at a time, I won't burn out. I figure this list should keep me busy for a few weeks months. So far I've completed the playroom, which actually could use more storage... But small steps, both boy's closets(but perhaps I'll be adding some paint to spruce them up a bit, thanks to this post at The Scott's Crib), the master closets, and the linen closet. I will keep you posted as I happily take on these fun projects.

Until next time, Leiah